I Hate My WordPress Theme! Yuck!!
Hi,
So I’ve been surfing the web for the last week looking for the “ideal” WordPress theme because I really, really, really don’t like my theme. It’s too “blah” — not enough color. I love color, but nothing over the top! Have I ever mentioned that in my young days when I had LOTSA hair, I used to have a blue mohawk?? No…ok, we’ll leave that story for another time…
So what to do?
I could get a custom wordpress theme made, but they can get expensive and at this point I’m not into spending $500 or more for a custom theme.
So what else can I do?
Well the solution is make my own theme! But where to start?
I’m a software developer and can reverse engineer just about anything to figure out what makes it tick. So there are a couple of options:
- Find a theme that I like, analyze it and add my own touches to it.
- Hire someone.
- Build it from scratch.
All three will take time. I’ll learn a lot from the first option.
On the second option, I’ll be tied to the company that creates it unless I get all the images in a format I can work with.
Third option is the best.
I found a set of slightly old posts over at CypherHackz.net that teach you how to create your own WordPress themes - http://www.cypherhackz.net/archives/2006/12/13/make-your-own-wordpress-theme-part-1/. Fantastic! Just what I was looking for.
If you’re technically inclined and want to do something challenging (by the way, my son tells me that his Montessori teacher tells him he has to do something challenging every day - so that’s your challenge as well) try developing your own theme.
Why would you want to do this?
Fame? Fortune?
Nah… LINKBACKS! You see most “free” themes require the person using it to leave the link back to the site that created the theme. Although there is nothing from stopping you, or anyone else from simply deleting the linback most people don’t.
Can you imagine how many links you could get to your site if you create a rockin’ theme, upload it to the dozens and dozens of free WordPress theme sites out there and each gets 100 or 200 downloads? I’ve seen crappy themes get hundreds of downloads! Push out something of quality and you’ll be drooling in linkbacks from potentially hundreds of sites.
Of course you could just commission some themes for yourself by using RentACoder or eLance…
Hey… did you figure out that this was a traffic generating “secret”?
Regards,
Mohamed
P.S. I don’t really hate my theme… it’s just time for a new one. Do you have any recommendations? I really like the theme over at John Chow dot Com (http://www.johnchow.com).
Popularity: 11% [?]
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
Comments
Hi Stephen,
Thanks for the tip! I remember MonsterTemplates from years back, but never thought of seeing their offerings. I will head over there right now and see if I can find myself a cool new theme.
Thanks!
Mohamed
There are a ton of themes out there and I struggled searching for one myself. At first glance, one of the “premium” paid-for themes here: http://www.revolutiontheme.com/ (no aff) might fit the style of what you’re looking for (similar to Chow’s). I wouldn’t be surprised if he was using a custom variation of one of them.
There’s always the CleanCopy Theme made free by Michel Fortin and Cory Miller. They are doing exactly what you talk about in providing a free theme with their links at the bottom. Ray Edwards, and many others do this as well. Like you, I’ve considered a custom theme which I’d own and allow use of as long as footer links remain. The idea has huge potential as long as you have the skills, or money to pull it off.
Hey, here’s an idea you can steal/borrow… Get a handful of people (maybe 3 or 4) to subsidize the custom theme creation in exchange for one of 3 or 4 targeted links at the bottom. I’d be up for that myself–at least in principle. Any discount for the idea? 
Personally, after what seemed like forever, I settled on a new free theme and some of the problems with my prior (paid for) one disappeared. Look-wise, it’s like a slightly prettier Clean Copy:
http://www.blogohblog.com/wordpress-theme-xplosive/
In almost any case, you’ll have to monkey with the templates to get them to blend well with your style, pictures, etc..
-Tim
Hi Mohamed! Just found your blog on Mybloglog. Your´e right, this theme is a bit pale.I use a theme called “Super Adsense Wordpress Theme”.It has monetizing like Clickbank and Adsense ready “built-in”.If you want to see what this theme looks like, just check out my blog.
Thanks!
-Tom
Hi Tom,
Thanks!
Yah it is a bit pale, isn’t it.
I will pop over right now and have a look. Thanks!!
Regards,
Mohamed
Hi Mohamed,
Didn’t see any email. Could be spam filter. Could you resend with the address given in this post?
Thanks!
Tim
Hi Tom,
What do you think of the new theme? I like the dark colors and am playing with it in a pre-production environment to lighten some of the colors to make it feel warmer.
Take care,
Mohamed
[...] looking for just the right theme for my blog (I like this one - it’s nicer than my previous theme - nothing against the designer, I just didn’t like it personally) I visited hundreds of [...]
Hi Don,
Thanks - but we’re still not satisfied. Mo has been working on building a few custom templates. He’s got one that he is working on and about 3 more on the drawing board.
You can check it out at http://themes.oibo.org
Robert
Hi Mohamed, have you ever checked out monstertemplates.com? They’ve got some cool templates for under a $100.